Board game review of Dungeon Designer: Successful dungeons in the Roll Player universe?

In recent years, two successful spin-offs of the popular dice game Roll Player have been released in the Roll & Write format – The Cartographer and The Cartographer. The former was even Kennerspiel of the year 2020 nominated. Stonespire Architects, or in German Dungeon Designer, is a new spin-off from Jordy Adan, who was also responsible for the other two encapsulations. The German version was also published by Pegasus SpieleFind out what we thought of Dungeon Designer in this review.

The art of creating intricate labyrinths has been passed down among the Minotaurs for ages. We learned this glorious craft under the famous Master Hortgully. After 10 years of training, it is now time to put our acquired knowledge to the test. One last task separates us from our fame. We must build a dangerous dungeon at the foot of the Stoneridge Mountains and impress Master Hortgully with it.

We build a dungeon

Dungeon Designer is a card drafting game in which we try to build a dungeon that is based on the goals and specifications of the master Hortgully in order to gain the most prestige for our building at the end. The clever placement of rooms, objects and monsters plays an important role. A game lasts for four rounds (years), which are divided into three phases - building, improving, cleaning. Every year we build a new level in our dungeon.

In the construction phase, we place the rooms in the current level of our dungeon. A level consists of four rooms, so the construction phase is divided into four rounds. In each of these rounds, we place a room card in the current level of our dungeon. At the end of a round, we pass our room cards on to our next player. This means that with each new round, we have different rooms that we have to cleverly place in our dungeon.

When placing the rooms, you should try to meet the requirements of the blueprint that you received at the beginning of the game. The more requirements your dungeon meets, the more points you get. The path of the dungeon also plays an important role, because the longer it is from the entrance or exit, the more reputation you get at the end of the game. Later in the game, personal tasks come into play that also have to be completed. So, playthrough after playthrough, you have to think carefully about which room you place where on the current level.

Dungeon Shopping

After the construction phase, we move on to the improvement phase. To do this, we first determine our current gold supply by looking at how much money the rooms we have just played give us. As a rule, the slightly better rooms give us less gold later on and the worse rooms give us a little more. In addition, we receive one gold for each treasure chest in our dungeon. The person who has the most gold can start the improvement phase.

The person can now purchase a trap, monster or other special features for their dungeon. What is available and what it costs is determined by the market. After the active person has purchased something for their dungeon, it is checked again to see who has the most gold. This person can then go shopping at the market. This means that if you are clever, you can purchase items several times in a row. You can then use the items to fulfill the requirements of your dungeon by placing them appropriately in the rooms.

The improvement phase continues until all players have passed. If you pass, you can take one of the task cards on display and move up the ranking bar (which breaks ties). The sooner you pass, the more choice you have and the better positioned you are for the next round. Finally, the game is prepared for the next round in the cleanup phase.

The game ends as soon as the fourth row of the dungeon has been built. Now you evaluate the various task cards that you received during the improvement phase. In addition, you compare the final ranking and the goal of Master Hortgully and receive more or fewer points depending on your placement. It also counts how well you have fulfilled the construction plan and how well the paths are connected to the entrance and exit. The person with the most points wins.

Successful solo mode

Dungeon Designer also comes with a solo mode in which we have to compete against Jael, the queen's closest advisor. In the classic way, we build our dungeon turn by turn, but we keep getting new cards. We have to put one of the cards in our dungeon and we can take one with us into the next turn. However, you have to be careful which cards you use, because Jael collects cards with certain symbols every round. Depending on which cards we don't play, we may leave cards to Jael. With these, he can generate more or fewer points at the end. Like us, Jael gets points for certain tasks that he receives randomly, as well as the general goal. Whoever has the most victory points at the end wins the solo game.

Depending on the level of difficulty, this can be difficult or really tough, but never impossible. It is interesting to have to decide which cards to play turn by turn. Often it happens that you have to play an unsuitable card so that it does not go to Jael. This then has to be corrected by making purchases.

The only drawback in the first edition and only in the solo mode: the numbering on the task cards is missing. However, Pegasus Spiele has provided a PDF for this, which can also be can download.

Information about Dungeon Designer

Conclusion

In general, Dungeon Designer is a really good game. It's fun to build your own dungeon and decide turn by turn which card should be placed where. The game remains pleasantly simple and easy to understand - despite being a connoisseur's game. Even casual players shouldn't have any problems here. The hardest thing about the game is probably thinking about where to place a card in order to best achieve your tasks and goals and generate lots of points. Otherwise, it's simple: play a card, pass the rest of the cards to the next person. Do this 4 times in total. Then it's time to go shopping and start again from the beginning.

It is precisely this simplicity that makes me very happy after work at the moment. A game takes no longer than an hour and is perfect for days when work leaves you very exhausted. And yet the game remains exciting and has little tactical tricks that you can use to control the game. At a price of around 40 euros, you definitely can't go wrong with Dungeon Designer. It also has a high replay value due to the sheer variety of room maps, tasks and goals. A worthy successor in the Roll Player universe.

Preview	Product	Rating	Price
	Pegasus Games Dungeon Designer*	Currently no reviews	35,99 EUR

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